Speakers

Ranked among the most influential women of 2019 by “Forbes” magazine, Nathalie Balla is the President and CEO of La Redoute as of 2009.

After graduating from ESCP-EAP Paris and earning a PhD in Economics and Finance, she began her career in 1989 as an auditor at Price Waterhouse in Switzerland.

She then joined the Karstadt Quelle Group as General Manager Switzerland and Austria from 1996 to 1998 and then joined Quelle Versand, in Switzerland, as General Manager from 1998 to 2001, before joining Quelle and Neckermann AG, in Germany, as a member of the COMEX managing the international scope from 2001 to 2005.

In late 2005, she was appointed Managing Director of Robert Klingel Europe, Germany’s number 4 home shopping company. She joined La Redoute in 2009 as President and CEO before becoming Co-President in 2014, alongside Éric Courteille.

She works, along with a number of other female entrepreneurs, to promote gender diversity in the business as well as diversity (age, nationality, sex…). In 201, at La Redoute, the equal pay index was 89%, an increase of four points compared to the previous year. Nathalie Balla set a goal of 95%. In 2018, she co-founded Sista, a movement launched to promote female entrepreneurship and facilitate access to funding.

Holder of the Veuve-Clicquot Businesswoman Award in 2018 and listed as one of the most influential women of 2019 by “Forbes” magazine, Nathalie Balla received the distinction of Knight of the Legion of Honor in July 2021.

(Photo credit: Léo Paul Ridet)